September 11
will surely go down in the annals of terrorism as a defining moment.
Throughout the world, the atrocities were condemned as grave crimes
against humanity, with near-universal agreement that all states must
act to "rid the world of evildoers," that "the evil scourge of
terrorism" -- particularly state-backed international terrorism -- is
a plague spread by "depraved opponents of civilization itself" in a
"return to barbarism" that cannot be tolerated. But beyond the strong
support for the words of the US political leadership -- respectively,
George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, and his Secretary of State George
Shultz [1] -- interpretations varied: on the narrow question of the
proper response to terrorist crimes, and on the broader problem of
determining their nature.

On the latter, an official US definition takes "terrorism" to be
"the calculated use of violence or threat of violence to attain goals
that are political, religious, or ideological in nature...through
intimidation, coercion, or instilling fear."[2] That formulation
leaves many question open, among them, the legitimacy of actions to
realize "the right to self-determination, freedom, and independence,
as derived from the Charter of the United Nations, of people forcibly
deprived of that right..., particularly peoples under colonial and
racist regimes and foreign occupation..." In its most forceful
denunciation of the crime of terrorism, the UN General Assembly
endorsed such actions, 153-2.[3]

Explaining their negative votes, the US and Israel referred to the
wording just cited. It was understood to justify resistance against
the South African regime, a US ally that was responsible for over 1.5
million dead and $60 billion in damage in neighboring countries in
1980-88 alone, putting aside its practices within. And the resistance
was led by Nelson Mandela's African National Congress, one of the
"more notorious terrorist groups" according to a 1988 Pentagon report,
in contrast to pro-South African RENAMO, which the same report
describes as merely an "indigenous insurgent group" while observing
that it might have killed 100,000 civilians in Mozambique in the
preceding two years.[4] The same wording was taken to justify
resistance to Israel's military occupation, then in its 20th year,
continuing its integration of the occupied territories and harsh
practices with decisive US aid and diplomatic support, the latter to
block the longstanding international consensus on a peaceful
settlement.[5]

Despite such fundamental disagreements, the official US definition
seems to me adequate for the purposes at hand,[6] though the
disagreements shed some light on the nature of terrorism, as perceived
from various perspectives.

Let us turn to the question of proper response. Some argue that the
evil of terrorism is "absolute" and merits a "reciprocally absolute
doctrine" in response.[7] That would appear to mean ferocious military
assault in accord with the Bush doctrine, cited with apparent approval
in the same academic collection on the "age of terror": "_If you
harbor terrorists, you're a terrorist; if you aid and abet terrorists,
you're a terrorist -- and you will be treated like one_." The volume
reflects articulate opinion in the West in taking the US-UK response
to be appropriate and properly "calibrated," but the scope of that
consensus appears to be limited, judging by the evidence available, to
which we return.

More generally, it would be hard to find anyone who accepts the
doctrine that massive bombing is the appropriate response to terrorist
crimes -- whether those of Sept. 11, or even worse ones, which are,
unfortunately, not hard to find. That follows if we adopt the
principle of universality: if an action is right (or wrong) for
others, it is right (or wrong) for us. Those who do not rise to the
minimal moral level of applying to themselves the standards they apply
to others -- more stringent ones, in fact -- plainly cannot be taken
seriously when they speak of appropriateness of response; or of right
and wrong, good and evil.

To illustrate what is at stake, consider a case that is far from
the most extreme but is uncontroversial; at least, among those with
some respect for international law and treaty obligations. No one
would have supported Nicaraguan bombings in Washington when the US
rejected the order of the World Court to terminate its "unlawful use
of force" and pay substantial reparations, choosing instead to
escalate the international terrorist crimes and to extend them,
officially, to attacks on undefended civilian targets, also vetoing a
Security Council resolution calling on all states to observe
international law and voting alone at the General Assembly (with one
or two client states) against similar resolutions. The US dismissed
the ICJ on the grounds that other nations do not agree with us, so we
must "reserve to ourselves the power to determine whether the Court
has jurisdiction over us in a particular case" and what lies
"essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of the United States" --
in this case, terrorist attacks against Nicaragua.[8]

Meanwhile Washington continued to undermine regional efforts to
reach a political settlement, following the doctrine formulated by the
Administration moderate, George Shultz: the US must "cut [the
Nicaraguan cancer] out," by force. Shultz dismissed with contempt
those who advocate "utopian, legalistic means like outside mediation,
the United Nations, and the World Court, while ignoring the power
element of the equation";"Negotiations are a euphemism for
capitulation if the shadow of power is not cast across the bargaining
table," he declared. Washington continued to adhere to the Shultz
doctrine when the Central American Presidents agreed on a peace plan
in 1987 over strong US objections: the Esquipulas Accords, which
required that all countries of the region move towards democracy and
human rights under international supervision, stressing that the
"indispensable element" was the termination of the US attack against
Nicaragua. Washington responded by sharply expanding the attack,
tripling CIA supply flights for the terrorist forces. Having exempted
itself from the Accords, thus effectively undermining them, Washington
proceeded to do the same for its client regimes, using the substance
-- not the shadow -- of power to dismantle the International
Verification Commission (CIVS) because its conclusions were
unacceptable, and demanding, successfully, that the Accords be revised
to free US client states to continue their terrorist atrocities. These
far surpassed even the devastating US war against Nicaragua that left
tens of thousands dead and the country ruined perhaps beyond recovery.
Still upholding the Shultz doctrine, the US compelled the government
of Nicaragua, under severe threat, to drop the claim for reparations
established by the ICJ.[9]

There could hardly be a clearer example of international terrorism
as defined officially, or in scholarship: operations aimed at
"demonstrating through apparently indiscriminate violence that the
existing regime cannot protect the people nominally under its
authority," thus causing not only "anxiety, but withdrawal from the
relationships making up the established order of society."[10] State
terror elsewhere in Central America in those years also counts as
international terrorism, in the light of the decisive US role, and the
goals, sometimes frankly articulated; for example, by the Army's
School of the Americas, which trains Latin American military officers
and takes pride in the fact that "Liberation Theology...was defeated
with the assistance of the U.S. Army."[11]

It would seem to follow, clearly enough, that only those who
support bombing of Washington in response to these international
terrorist crimes -- that is, no one -- can accept the "reciprocally
absolute doctrine" on response to terrorist atrocities or consider
massive bombardment to be an appropriate and properly "calibrated"
response to them.

Consider some of the legal arguments that have been presented to
justify the US-UK bombing of Afghanistan; I am not concerned here with
their soundness, but their implications, if the principle of uniform
standards is maintained. Christopher Greenwood argues that the US has
the right of "self-defense" against "those who caused or
threatened...death and destruction," appealing to the ICJ ruling in
the Nicaragua case. The paragraph he cites applies far more clearly to
the US war against Nicaragua than to the Taliban or al-Qaeda, so if it
is taken to justify intensive US bombardment and ground attack in
Afghanistan, then Nicaragua should have been entitled to carry out
much more severe attacks against the US. Another distinguished
professor of international law, Thomas Franck, supports the US-UK war
on grounds that "a state is responsible for the consequences of
permitting its territory to be used to injure another state"; fair
enough, and surely applicable to the US in the case of Nicaragua,
Cuba, and many other examples, including some of extreme severity.[12]

Needless to say, in none of these cases would violence in "self-defense"
against continuing acts of "death and destruction" be considered
remotely tolerable; acts, not merely "threats."

The same holds of more nuanced proposals about an appropriate
response to terrorist atrocities. Military historian Michael Howard
proposes "a police operation conducted under the auspices of the
United Nations...against a criminal conspiracy whose members should be
hunted down and brought before an international court, where they
would receive a fair trial and, if found guilty, be awarded an
appropriate sentence." Reasonable enough, though the idea that the
proposal should be applied universally is unthinkable. The director of
the Center for the Politics of Human Rights at Harvard argues that
"The only responsible response to acts of terror is honest police work
and judicial prosecution in courts of law, linked to determinate,
focused and unrelenting use of military power against those who cannot
or will not be brought to justice."[13] That too seems sensible, if we
add Howard's qualification about international supervision, and if the
resort to force is undertaken after legal means have been exhausted.
The recommendation therefore does not apply to 9-11 (the US refused to
provide evidence and rebuffed tentative proposals about transfer of
the suspects), but it does apply very clearly to Nicaragua.

It applies to other cases as well. Take Haiti, which has provided
ample evidence in its repeated calls for extradition of Emmanuel
Constant, who directed the forces responsible for thousands of deaths
under the military junta that the US was tacitly supporting (not to
speak of earlier history); these requests the US ignores, presumably
because of concerns about what Constant would reveal if tried. The
most recent request was on 30 September 2001, while the US was
demanding that the Taliban hand over Bin Laden.[14] The coincidence
was also ignored, in accord with the convention that minimal moral
standards must be vigorously rejected.

Turning to the "responsible response," a call for implementation of
it where it is clearly applicable would elicit only fury and contempt.

Some have formulated more general principles to justify the US war
in Afghanistan. Two Oxford scholars propose a principle of
"proportionality": "The magnitude of response will be determined by
the magnitude with which the aggression interfered with key values in
the society attacked"; in the US case, "freedom to pursue
self-betterment in a plural society through market economics,"
viciously attacked on 9-11 by "aggressors...with a moral orthodoxy
divergent from the West." Since "Afghanistan constitutes a state that
sided with the aggressor," and refused US demands to turn over
suspects, "the United States and its allies, according to the
principle of magnitude of interference, could justifiably and morally
resort to force against the Taliban government."[15]

On the assumption of universality, it follows that Haiti and
Nicaragua can "justifiably and morally resort to" far greater force
against the US government. The conclusion extends far beyond these two
cases, including much more serious ones and even such minor escapades
of Western state terror as Clinton's bombing of the al-Shifa
pharmaceutical plant in Sudan in 1998, leading to "several tens of
thousands" of deaths according to the German Ambassador and other
reputable sources, whose conclusions are consistent with the immediate
assessments of knowledgeable observers.[16] The principle of
proportionality therefore entails that Sudan had every right to carry
out massive terror in retaliation, a conclusion that is strengthened
if we go on to adopt the view that this act of "the empire" had
"appalling consequences for the economy and society" of Sudan so that
the atrocity was much worse than the crimes of 9-11, which were
appalling enough, but did not have such consequences.[17]

Most commentary on the Sudan bombing keeps to the question of
whether the plant was believed to produce chemical weapons; true or
false, that has no bearing on "the magnitude with which the aggression
interfered with key values in the society attacked," such as survival.
Others point out that the killings were unintended, as are many of the
atrocities we rightly denounce. In this case, we can hardly doubt that
the likely human consequences were understood by US planners. The acts
can be excused, then, only on the Hegelian assumption that Africans
are "mere things," whose lives have "no value," an attitude that
accords with practice in ways that are not overlooked among the
victims, who may draw their own conclusions about the "moral orthodoxy
of the West."

One participant in the Yale volume (Charles Hill) recognized that
11 September opened the _second_ "war on terror." The first was
declared by the Reagan administration as it came to office 20 years
earlier, with the rhetorical accompaniment already illustrated; and
"we won," Hill reports triumphantly, though the terrorist monster was
only wounded, not slain.[18] The first "age of terror" proved to be a
major issue in international affairs through the decade, particularly
in Central America, but also in the Middle East, where terrorism was
selected by editors as the lead story of the year in 1985 and ranked
high in other years.

We can learn a good deal about the current war on terror by
inquiring into the first phase, and how it is now portrayed. One
leading academic specialist describes the 1980s as the decade of
"state terrorism," of "persistent state involvement, or `sponsorship,'
of terrorism, especially by Libya and Iran." The US merely responded,
by adopting "a `proactive' stance toward terrorism." Others recommend
the methods by which "we won": the operations for which the US was
condemned by the World Court and Security Council (absent the veto)
are a model for "Nicaragua-like support for the Taliban's adversaries
(especially the Northern Alliance)." A prominent historian of the
subject finds deep roots for the terrorism of Osama Bin Laden: in
South Vietnam, where "the effectiveness of Vietcong terror against the
American Goliath armed with modern technology kindled hopes that the
Western heartland was vulnerable too."[19]

Keeping to convention, these analyses portray the US as a benign
victim, defending itself from the terror of others: the Vietnamese (in
South Vietnam), the Nicaraguans (in Nicaragua), Libyans and Iranians
(if they had ever suffered a slight at US hands, it passes unnoticed),
and other anti-American forces worldwide.

Not everyone sees the world quite that way. The most obvious place
to look is Latin America, which has had considerable experience with
international terrorism. The crimes of 9-11 were harshly condemned,
but commonly with recollection of their own experiences. One might
describe the 9-11 atrocities as "Armageddon," the research journal of
the Jesuit university in Managua observed, but Nicaragua has "lived
its own Armageddon in excruciating slow motion" under US assault "and
is now submerged in its dismal aftermath," and others fared far worse
under the vast plague of state terror that swept through the continent
from the early 1960s, much of it traceable to Washington. A Panamanian
journalist joined in the general condemnation of the 9-11 crimes, but
recalled the death of perhaps thousands of poor people (Western
crimes, therefore unexamined) when the President's father bombed the
barrio Chorillo in December 1989 in Operation Just Cause, undertaken
to kidnap a disobedient thug who was sentenced to life imprisonment in
Florida for crimes mostly committed while he was on the CIA payroll.
Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano observed that the US claims to oppose
terrorism, but actually supports it worldwide, including "in
Indonesia, in Cambodia, in Iran, in South Africa,...and in the Latin
American countries that lived through the dirty war of the Condor
Plan," instituted by South American military dictators who conducted a
reign of terror with US backing.[20]

The observations carry over to the second focus of the first "war
on terror": West Asia. The worst single atrocity was the Israeli
invasion of Lebanon in 1982, which left some 20,000 people dead and
much of the country in ruins, including Beirut. Like the murderous and
destructive Rabin-Peres invasions of 1993 and 1996, the 1982 attack
had little pretense of self-defense. Chief of Staff Rafael ("Raful")
Eitan merely articulated common understanding when he announced that
the goal was to "destroy the PLO as a candidate for negotiations with
us about the Land of Israel,"[21] a textbook illustration of terror as
officially defined. The goal "was to install a friendly regime and
destroy Mr. Arafat's Palestinian Liberation Organization," Middle East
correspondent James Bennet writes: "That, the theory went, would help
persuade Palestinians to accept Israeli rule in the West Bank and Gaza
Strip."[22] This may be the first recognition in the mainstream of
facts widely reported in Israel at once, previously accessible only in
dissident literature in the US.

These operations were carried out with the crucial military and
diplomatic support of the Reagan and Clinton administrations, and
therefore constitute international terrorism. The US was also directly
involved in other acts of terror in the region in the 1980s, including
the most extreme terrorist atrocities of the peak year of 1985: the
CIA car-bombing in Beirut that killed 80 people and wounded 250;
Shimon Peres's bombing of Tunis that killed 75 people, expedited by
the US and praised by Secretary of State Shultz, unanimously condemned
by the UN Security Council as an "act of armed aggression" (US
abstaining); and Peres's "Iron Fist" operations directed against
"terrorist villagers" in Lebanon, reaching new depths of "calculated
brutality and arbitrary murder," in the words of a Western diplomat
familiar with the area, amply supported by direct coverage.[23] Again,
all international terrorism, if not the more severe war crime of
aggression.

In journalism and scholarship on terrorism, 1985 is recognized to
be the peak year of Middle East terrorism, but not because of these
events: rather, because of two terrorist atrocities in which a single
person was murdered, in each case an American.[24] But the victims do
not so easily forget.

This very recent history takes on added significance because
leading figures in the re-declared "war on terror" played a prominent
part in its precursor. The diplomatic component of the current phase
is led by John Negroponte, who was Reagan's Ambassador to Honduras,
the base for the terrorist atrocities for which his government was
condemned by the World Court and for US-backed state terror elsewhere
in Central America, activities that "made the Reagan years the worse
decade for Central America since the Spanish conquest," mostly on
Negroponte's watch.[25] The military component of the new phase is led
by Donald Rumsfeld, Reagan's special envoy to the Middle East during
the years of the worst terrorist atrocities there, initiated or
supported by his government.

No less instructive is the fact that such atrocities did not abate
in subsequent years. Specifically, Washington's contribution to
"enhancing terror" in the Israel-Arab confrontation continues. The
term is President Bush's, intended, according to convention, to apply
to the terrorism of others. Departing from convention, we find, again,
some rather significant examples. One simple way to enhance terror is
to participate in it, for example, by sending helicopters to be used
to attack civilian complexes and carry out assassinations, as the US
regularly does in full awareness of the consequences. Another is to
bar the dispatch of international monitors to reduce violence. The US
has insisted on this course, once again vetoing a UN Security Council
resolution to this effect on 14 December 2001. Describing Arafat's
fall from grace to a position barely above Bin Laden and Saddam
Hussein, the press reports that President Bush was "greatly angered
[by] a last-minute hardening of a Palestinian position...for
international monitors in Palestinian areas under a UN Security
Council resolution"; that is, by Arafat's joining the rest of the
world in calling for means to reduce terror.[26]

Ten days before the veto of monitors, the US boycotted -- thus
undermined -- an international conference in Geneva that reaffirmed
the applicability of the Fourth Geneva Convention to the occupied
terrorities, so that most US-Israeli actions there are war crimes --
and when "grave breaches," as many are, serious war crimes. These
include US-funded Israeli settlements and the practice of "wilful
killing, torture, unlawful deportation, wilful depriving of the rights
of fair and regular trial, extensive destruction and appropriation of
property...carried out unlawfully and wantonly."[27]

The Convention, instituted to criminalize formally the crimes of
the Nazis in occupied Europe, is a core principle of international
humanitarian law. Its applicability to the Israeli-occupied
territories has repeatedly been affirmed, among other occasions, by UN
Ambassador George Bush (September 1971) and by Security Council
resolutions: 465 (1980), adopted unanimously, which condemned
US-backed Israeli practices as "flagrant violations" of the
Convention; 1322 (Oct. 2000), 14-0, US abstaining, which called on
Israel "to abide scrupulously by its responsibilities under the Fourth
Geneva Convention," which it was again violating flagrantly at that
moment. As High Contracting Parties, the US and the European powers
are obligated by solemn treaty to apprehend and prosecute those
responsible for such crimes, including their own leadership when they
are parties to them. By continuing to reject that duty, they are
enhancing terror directly and significantly.

Inquiry into the US-Israel-Arab conflicts would carry us too far
afield. Let's turn further north, to another region where "state
terror" is being practiced on a massive scale; I borrow the term from
the Turkish State Minister for Human Rights, referring to the vast
atrocities of 1994; and sociologist Ismail Besikci, returned to prison
after publishing his book _State Terror in the Near East_, having
already served 15 years for recording Turkish repression of Kurds.[28]
I had a chance to see some of the consequences first-hand when
visiting the unofficial Kurdish capital of Diyarbakir several months
after 9-11. As elsewhere, the crimes of September 11 were harshly
condemned, but not without memory of the savage assault the population
had suffered at the hands of those who appoint themselves to "rid the
world of evildoers," and their local agents. By 1994, the Turkish
State Minister and others estimated that 2 million had been driven out
of the devastated countryside, many more later, often with barbaric
torture and terror described in excruciating detail in international
human rights reports, but kept from the eyes of those paying the
bills. Tens of thousands were killed. The remnants -- whose courage is
indescribable -- live in a dungeon where radio stations are closed and
journalists imprisoned for playing Kurdish music, students are
arrested and tortured for submitting requests to take elective courses
in their own language, there can be severe penalties if children are
found wearing Kurdish national colors by the omnipresent security
forces, the respected lawyer who heads the human rights organization
was indicted shortly after I was there for using the Kurdish rather
than the virtually identical Turkish spelling for the New Year's
celebration; and on, and on.

These acts fall under the category of state-sponsored international
terrorism. The US provided 80% of the arms, peaking in 1997, when arms
transfers exceeded the entire Cold War period combined before the
"counter-terror" campaign began in 1984. Turkey became the leading
recipient of US arms worldwide, a position it retained until 1999 when
the torch was passed to Colombia, the leading practitioner of state
terror in the Western hemisphere.[29]

State terror is also "enhanced" by silence and evasion. The
achievement was particularly notable against the background of an
unprecedented chorus of self-congratulation as US foreign policy
entered a "noble phase" with a "saintly glow," under the guidance of
leaders who for the first time in history were dedicated to
"principles and values" rather than narrow interests.[30] The proof of
the new saintliness was their unwillingness to tolerate crimes near
the borders of NATO -- only within its borders, where even worse
crimes, not in reaction to NATO bombs, were not only tolerable but
required enthusiastic participation, without comment.

US-sponsored Turkish state terror does not pass entirely unnoticed.
The State Department's annual report on Washington's "efforts to
combat terrorism" singled out Turkey for its "positive experiences" in
combating terror, along with Algeria and Spain, worthy colleagues.
This was reported without comment in a front-page story in the _New
York Times_ by its specialist on terrorism. In a leading journal of
international affairs, Ambassador Robert Pearson reports that the US
"could have no better friend and ally than Turkey" in its efforts "to
eliminate terrorism" worldwide, thanks to the "capabilities of its
armed forces" demonstrated in its "anti-terror campaign" in the
Kurdish southeast. It thus "came as no surprise" that Turkey eagerly
joined the "war on terror" declared by George Bush, expressing its
thanks to the US for being the only country willing to lend the needed
support for the atrocities of the Clinton years -- still continuing,
though on a lesser scale now that "we won." As a reward for its
achievements, the US is now funding Turkey to provide the ground
forces for fighting "the war on terror" in Kabul, though not
beyond.[31]

Atrocious state-sponsored international terrorism is thus not
overlooked: it is lauded. That also "comes as no surprise." After all,
in 1995 the Clinton administration welcomed Indonesia's General
Suharto, one of the worst killers and torturers of the late 20th
century, as "our kind of guy." When he came to power 30 years earlier,
the "staggering mass slaughter" of hundreds of thousands of people,
mostly landless peasants, was reported fairly accurately and acclaimed
with unconstrained euphoria. When Nicaraguans finally succumbed to US
terror and voted the right way, the US was "United in Joy" at this
"Victory for US Fair Play," headlines proclaimed. It is easy enough to
multiply examples. The current episode breaks no new ground in the
record of international terrorism and the response it elicits among
the perpetrators.

Let's return to the question of the proper response to acts of
terror, specifically 9-11.

It is commonly alleged that the US-UK reaction was undertaken with
wide international support. That is tenable, however, only if one
keeps to elite opinion. An international Gallup poll found only
minority support for military attack rather than diplomatic means.[32]
In Europe, figures ranged from 8% in Greece to 29% in France. In Latin
America, support was even lower: from 2% in Mexico to 16% in Panama.
Support for strikes that included civilian targets was very slight.
Even in the two countries polled that strongly supported the use of
military force, India and Israel (where the reasons were parochial),
considerable majorities opposed such attacks. There was, then,
overwhelming opposition to the actual policies, which turned major
urban concentrations into "ghost towns" from the first moment, the
press reported.

Omitted from the poll, as from most commentary, was the anticipated
effect of US policy on Afghans, millions of whom were on the brink of
starvation even before 9-11. Unasked, for example, is whether a proper
response to 9-11 was to demand that Pakistan eliminate "truck convoys
that provide much of the food and other supplies to Afghanistan's
civilian population," and to cause the withdrawal of aid workers and a
severe reduction in food supplies that left "millions of Afghans...at
grave risk of starvation," eliciting sharp protests from aid
organizations and warnings of severe humanitarian crisis, judgments
reiterated at the war's end.[33]

It is, of course, the assumptions of planning that are relevant to
evaluating the actions taken; that too should be transparent. The
actual outcome, a separate matter, is unlikely to be known, even
roughly; crimes of others are carefully investigated, but not one's
own. Some indication is perhaps suggested by the occasional reports on
numbers needing food aid: 5 million before 9-11, 7.5 million at the
end of September under the threat of bombing, 9 million six months
later, not because of lack of food, which was readily available
throughout, but because of distribution problems as the country
reverted to warlordism.[34]

There are no reliable studies of Afghan opinion, but information is
not entirely lacking. At the outset, President Bush warned Afghans
that they would be bombed until they handed over people the US
suspected of terrorism. Three weeks later, war aims shifted to
overthrow of the regime: the bombing would continue, Admiral Sir
Michael Boyce announced, "until the people of the country themselves
recognize that this is going to go on until they get the leadership
changed."[35] Note that the question whether overthrow of the
miserable Taliban regime justifies the bombing does not arise, because
that did not become a war aim until well after the fact. We can,
however, ask about the opinions of Afghans within reach of Western
observers about these choices -- which, in both cases, clearly fall
within the official definition of international terrorism.

As war aims shifted to regime replacement in late October, 1000
Afghan leaders gathered in Peshawar, some exiles, some coming from
within Afghanistan, all committed to overthrowing the Taliban regime.
It was "a rare display of unity among tribal elders, Islamic scholars,
fractious politicians, and former guerrilla commanders," the press
reported. They unanimously "urged the US to stop the air raids,"
appealed to the international media to call for an end to the "bombing
of innocent people," and "demanded an end to the US bombing of
Afghanistan." They urged that other means be adopted to overthrow the
hated Taliban regime, a goal they believed could be achieved without
death and destruction.[36]

A similar message was conveyed by Afghan opposition leader Abdul
Haq, who was highly regarded in Washington. Just before he entered
Afghanistan, apparently without US support, and was then captured and
killed, he condemned the bombing and criticized the US for refusing to
support efforts of his and of others "to create a revolt within the
Taliban." The bombing was "a big setback for these efforts," he said.
He reported contacts with second-level Taliban commanders and
ex-Mujahiddin tribal elders, and discussed how such efforts could
proceed, calling on the US to assist them with funding and other
support instead of undermining them with bombs. But the US, he said,
"is trying to show its muscle, score a victory and scare everyone in
the world. They don't care about the suffering of the Afghans or how
many people we will lose."[37]

The plight of Afghan women elicited some belated concern after
9-11. After the war, there was even some recognition of the courageous
women who have been in the forefront of the struggle to defend women's
rights for 25 years, RAWA (Revolutionary Association of the Women of
Afghanistan). A week after the bombing began, RAWA issued a public
statement (Oct. 11) that would have been front-page news wherever
concern for Afghan women was real, not a matter of mere expediency.
They condemned the resort to "the monster of a vast war and
destruction" as the US "launched a vast aggression on our country,"
that will cause great harm to innocent Afghans. They called instead
for "the eradication of the plague of Taliban and Al Qieda" by "an
overall uprising" of the Afghan people themselves, which alone "can
prevent the repetition and recurrence of the catastrophe that has
befallen our country...."

All of this was ignored. It is, perhaps, less than obvious that
those with the guns are entitled to ignore the judgment of Afghans who
have been struggling for freedom and women's rights for many years,
and to dismiss with apparent contempt their desire to overthrow the
fragile and hated Taliban regime from within without the inevitable
crimes of war.

In brief, review of global opinion, including what is known about
Afghans, lends little support to the consensus among Western
intellectuals on the justice of their cause.

One elite reaction, however, is certainly correct: it is necessary
to inquire into the reasons for the crimes of 9-11. That much is
beyond question, at least among those who hope to reduce the
likelihood of further terrorist atrocities.

A narrow question is the motives of the perpetrators. On this
matter, there is little disagreement. Serious analysts are in accord
that after the US established permanent bases in Saudi Arabia, "Bin
Laden became preoccupied with the need to expel U.S. forces from the
sacred soil of Arabia" and to rid the Muslim world of the "liars and
hypocrites" who do not accept his extremist version of Islam.[38]

There is also wide, and justified, agreement that "Unless the
social, political, and economic conditions that spawned Al Qaeda and
other associated groups are addressed, the United States and its
allies in Western Europe and elsewhere will continue to be targeted by
Islamist terrorists."[39] These conditions are doubtless complex, but
some factors have long been recognized. In 1958, a crucial year in
postwar history, President Eisenhower advised his staff that in the
Arab world, "the problem is that we have a campaign of hatred against
us, not by the governments but by the people," who are "on Nasser's
side," supporting independent secular nationalism. The reasons for the
"campaign of hatred" had been outlined by the National Security
Council a few months earlier: "In the eyes of the majority of Arabs
the United States appears to be opposed to the realization of the
goals of Arab nationalism. They believe that the United States is
seeking to protect its interest in Near East oil by supporting the
_status quo_ and opposing political or economic progress...."
Furthermore, the perception is accurate: "our economic and cultural
interests in the area have led not unnaturally to close U.S. relations
with elements in the Arab world whose primary interest lies in the
maintenance of relations with the West and the status quo in their
countries...."[40]

The perceptions persist. Immediately after 9-11, the _Wall Street
Journal_, later others, began to investigate opinions of "moneyed
Muslims": bankers, professionals, managers of multinationals, and so
on. They strongly support US policies in general, but are bitter about
the US role in the region: about US support for corrupt and repressive
regimes that undermine democracy and development, and about specific
policies, particularly regarding Palestine and Iraq. Though they are
not surveyed, attitudes in the slums and villages are probably
similar, but harsher; unlike the "moneyed Muslims," the mass of the
population have never agreed that the wealth of the region should be
drained to the West and local collaborators, rather than serving
domestic needs. The "moneyed Muslims" recognize, ruefully, that Bin
Laden's angry rhetoric has considerable resonance, in their own
circles as well, even though they hate and fear him, if only because
they are among his primary targets.[41]

It is doubtless more comforting to believe that the answer to
George Bush's plaintive query, "Why do they hate us?," lies in their
resentment of our freedom and love of democracy, or their cultural
failings tracing back many centuries, or their inability to take part
in the form of "globalization" in which they happily participate.
Comforting, perhaps, but not wise.

Though shocking, the atrocities of 9-11 could not have been
entirely unexpected. Related organizations planned very serious
terrorist acts through the 1990s, and in 1993 came perilously close to
blowing up the World Trade Center, with much more ambitious plans.
Their thinking was well understood, certainly by the US intelligence
agencies that had helped to recruit, train, and arm them from 1980 and
continued to work with them even as they were attacking the US. The
Dutch government inquiry into the Srebrenica massacre revealed that
while they were attempting to blow up the World Trade Center, radical
Islamists from the CIA-formed networks were being flown by the US from
Afghanistan to Bosnia, along with Iranian-backed Hizbollah fighters
and a huge flow of arms, through Croatia, which took a substantial
cut. They were being brought to support the US side in the Balkan
wars, while Israel (along with Ukraine and Greece) was arming the
Serbs (possibly with US-supplied arms), which explains why "unexploded
mortar bombs landing in Sarajevo sometimes had Hebrew markings,"
British political scientist Richard Aldrich observes, reviewing the
Dutch government report.[42]

More generally, the atrocities of 9-11 serve as a dramatic reminder
of what has long been understood: with contemporary technology, the
rich and powerful no longer are assured the near monopoly of violence
that has largely prevailed throughout history. Though terrorism is
rightly feared everywhere, and is indeed an intolerable "return to
barbarism," it is not surprising that perceptions about its nature
differ rather sharply in the light of sharply differing experiences,
facts that will be ignored at their peril by those whom history has
accustomed to immunity while they perpetrate terrible crimes.

[5] For review of unilateral US rejectionism for 30 years, see my
introduction to Roane Carey, ed., _The New Intifada_ (London, New
York: Verso, 2000); see sources cited for more detail.

[6] It is, however, never used. On the reasons, see Alexander
George, ed., _Western State Terrorism_ (Cambridge: Polity-Blackwell,
1991).

[7] Strobe Talbott and Nayan Chanda, introduction, _The Age of
Terror: America and the World after September 11_ (New York: Basic
Books and the Yale U. Center for the Study of Globalization, 2001).

[8] Abram Sofaer, "The United States and the World Court," U.S.
Dept. of State, _Current Policy_, No. 769 (Dec. 1985). The vetoed
Security Council resolution called for compliance with the ICJ orders,
and, mentioning no one, called on all states "to refrain from carrying
out, supporting or promoting political, economic or military actions
of any kind against any state of the region." Elaine Sciolino, _NYT_,
July 31, 1986.

[10] Edward Price, "The Strategy and Tactics of Revolutionary
Terrorism," _Comparative Studies in Society and History 19:1_; cited
by Chalmers Johnson, "American Militarism and Blowback," _New
Political Science_ 24.1, 2002.

[11] SOA, 1999, cited by Adam Isacson and Joy Olson, _Just the
Facts_ (Washington: Latin America Working Group and Center for
International Policy, 1999), ix.

[12] Greenwood, "International law and the `war against
terrorism'," _International Affairs_ 78.2 (2002), appealing to par.
195 of _Nicaragua v. USA_, which the Court did not use to justify its
condemnation of US terrorism, but surely is more appropriate to that
than to the case that concerns Greenwood. Franck, "Terrorism and the
Right of Self-Defense," _American J. of International Law_ 95.4 (Oct.
2001).

[27] Conference of High Contracting Parties, _Report on Israeli
Settlement_, Jan.-Feb. 2002 (Foundation for Middle East Peace,
Washington). On these matters see Francis Boyle, "Law and Disorder in
the Middle East," _The Link_ 35.1, Jan.-March 2002.

[28] For some details, see my _New Military Humanism_ (Monroe ME:
Common Courage, 1999), chap. 3, and sources cited. On evasion of the
facts in the State Department Human Rights Report, see Lawyers
Committee for Human Rights, _Middle East and North Africa_ (New York,
1995), 255.

[29] Tamar Gabelnick, William Hartung, and Jennifer Washburn,
_Arming Repression: U.S. Arms Sales to Turkey During the Clinton
Administration_ (New York and Washington: World Policy Institute and
Federation of Atomic Scientists, October 1999). I exclude
Israel-Egypt, a separate category. On state terror in Colombia, now
largely farmed out to paramilitaries in standard fashion, see
particularly Human Rights Watch, _The Sixth Division_ (Sept. 2001) and
Colombia Human Rights Certification III, Feb. 2002. Also, among
others, Me'dicos Sin Fronteras, _Desterrados_ (Bogota' 2001).

[30] For a sample, see _New Military Humanism_ and my _A New
Generation Draws the Line_ (London, NY: Verso, 2000).

[33] John Burns, _NYT_, Sept. 16, 2001; Samina Amin, _International
Security_ 26.3, Winter 2001-02). For some earlier warnings, see
_9-11_. On the postwar evaluation of international agencies, see Imre
Karacs, _Independent on Sunday_ (London), Dec. 9, 2001, reporting
their warnings that over a million people are "beyond their reach and
face death from starvation and disease." For some press reports, see
my "Peering into the Abyss of the Future," Lakdawala Memorial Lecture,
Institute of Social Sciences, New Delhi, Nov. 2001, updated Feb. 2002.

[34] _Ibid._, for early estimates. Barbara Crossette, _NYT_, March
26, and Ahmed Rashid, _WSJ_, June 6, 2002, reporting the assessment of
the UN World Food Program and the failure of donors to provide pledged
funds. The WFP reports that "wheat stocks are exhausted, and there is
no funding" to replenish them (Rashid). The UN had warned of the
threat of mass starvation at once because the bombing disrupted
planting that provides 80% of the country's grain supplies (AFP, Sept.
28; Edith Lederer, AP, Oct. 18, 2001). Also Andrew Revkin, _NYT_, Dec.
16, 2001, citing U.S. Department of Agriculture, with no mention of
bombing.